There are two passages in earlier writers which are adduced as. proof that St. Paul at one time visited Spain. Since it is impossible to find room for such a journey within the period covered by the Acts, these passages, if accepted as proofs of the expedition to Spain, are therefore proofs of a missionary activity of St. Paul subsequent to the date of the close of the Acts. In the Letter of Clement of Rome to the Corinthians, § 5, the writer speaks of Peter and Paul as contemporary martyrs ; and Paul he describes as κῆρυξ γενόμενος ἔν τε τῇ ἀνατολῇ καὶ ἐν TH δύσει. . . δικαιοσύνην διδάξας ὅλον τὸν κόσμον καὶ ἐπὶ τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως ἐλθών.
It is difficult to believe that a native of Rome, writing from Rome, would speak of the world’s capital as ἡ δύσις Or τὸ τέρμα τῆς δύσεως ; ΠΟΓ did Corinth lie so far to the east of Rome as to justify such a rhe- torical expression (see Lightfoot’s note zm loc.). Nor can we argue from the opening of the following chapter—“ Unto these men of holy lives was gathered (συνηθροίσθη) a vast multitude’ ’—that Clement meant to date the fury of Neronic persecution as subsequent to the martyrdom of St. Paul. Writing about thirty years after “ the great tribulation,’ he mentions the martyrs in order of dignity. In any case, he mentions Peter’s death before that of Paul; yet this was never considered an argument against the tradition that the two apostles were martyred together ; nor would it be felt as a serious objection to the recent theory that St. Peter outlived St. Paul by many years.
The following passage from the Muratorian Canon, in its obscure simplicity, reads like a fragment of a genuine tradition rather than a literary figment based on Rom. xv. 28: ‘Acta autem omnium apostolorum sub uno libro scripta sunt. Lucas optime Theophilo comprendit, quia sub praesentia eius singula gerebantur, sicuti et semote passionem [perh. semota passione] Petri euidenter declarat, sed et profectionem [perh. profectione] Pauli ab urbe ad Spaniam proficiscentis’”’ (text as given by Westcott, Canon. N.T., p. 535). The argument is unaffected even if the words from ‘“ passionem” be de- rived from the early second century Actus Petri cum Simone. See James, Apocrypha Anecdota, ii., xi., and Dean Bernard, Pastoral Epp., p. xxx. These considerations force us to the conclusion that the as- sumption that St. Paul’s life ended where St. Luke’s history termin- ates is arbitrary, and contrary to the evidence that is available. It remains to present to the reader a conjectural outline (based on Lightfoot’s Biblical Essays, p. 223) of St. Paul’s movements between his release and his second Roman imprisonment.
(1) A journey from Rome to Asia Minor. It is natural to suppose